Was early marriage of queens not considered pedophilia?

Upvote:-3

In 1298 Emperor Andronicus II, defeated by Serbian King Stefan Milutin, promished him an imperial bride. He intended his sister, Eudokia, empress dowger of Trebizond, but she refused and Andronicus then selected his daughter Simonis or Simonida, who was born about 1294. The 50 year old Milutin divorced his third wife, Anna Terter, sister of the Bulgarian Tsar, and they were married in 1299 despite protests from the Byzantine clergy. after Milutin died in 1321 Simonida returned to Constantinople and entered a monastery, dying sometime after 1345.

It has been claimed that Militun did not wait until Simonida was old enough, but had sex with her soon after the marriage, and damaged her reproductive organs making her unable to have children. If that story is correct, it is sort of surprising that she was never accused of poisoning or assassinating Milutin.

edit 05/19/16

One account says the Patriarch of Constantinople was horrified by the idea of marrying off Simonida so young, but as unable to find any religious authority for absolute minimum age for marriage and absolute prohibition of marriage below any specific age.

Upvote:5

Marriages of royal and noble children were not consummated at the time of marriage. Instead, a date was designated for the consummation when both children were in their adolescence, typically with the younger being about 14. That met the "standards" of the time, although not modern standards.

Many of these child brides/grooms died before adolescence and consummation. That was taken in stride because the real purpose of the marriage had been served; an alliance between two powerful families, who used their children as pawns to further their own ends.

Upvote:6

Royal marriages in medieval times had nothing to do with personal values.

They were about political alliances and property and progeny. And indeed this made strange bedfellows. Minor details like being under-age were fixed because advancing family influence was far more important. The marriage tie and consummation were different events anyway. A bit of background can be found here.

Some famous extremes:

  1. Henry VIII of England in the name of progeny.
  2. The Habsburg Jaw from intermarriage to keep property in the family.

Upvote:19

No.

The term pedophilia was not coined until 1886; all of the examples you give were before the term existed.

Furthermore, and much more importantly, pedophilia has to do with sexual attraction, and none of these marriages had anything to do with sexual attraction. Although I have not done the required research, I'm confident in asserting that none of the parties involved (neither the spouses, nor their relatives, nor the governments that they represented) expected that the marriages would be consummated at these early ages.

As others have stated, these were political treaties that have very little to do with "marriage" as we understand it. I would expect different behavior at a family dinner the night after a holiday than you would at a state dinner where the President of the United States entertains a foreign dictator during a tense diplomatic standoff. The are both dinners, but they really can't be compared. Similarly the marriage between two royal houses cannot be compared to two peasants jumping the broom.

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